Who is this woman and why is she doing this?
I first read The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings in the late ’60s, when I was in high school. I am a detail freak, and so along with my friend Frankie Treiber, I became mildly obsessed with the history, culture and language of the books. We’re not talking about scholarly pursuits, mind you. Rather I spent hours practicing calligraphy that looked “Middle Earthish” or Elvish, wrote “Frodo Lives!” on my school notebook covers, and practiced saying “Luthien Tinuviel” for no apparent reason. I was in love with Frodo, Sam, Aragorn, Gandalf, and especially Shadowfax. But by the time I went to college, other interests had taken over.
Over thirty years later, when the Fellowship of the Ring was released in December, 2001, I was in a hell of my own making, working 70 hours/week in the Bay Area, over 3 hours from home. I was exhausted most of the time and didn’t even notice the movie release. When the Two Towers came out a year later, I didn’t want to see it until I had seen FOTR, and was afraid that if I watched them both it would be difficult to wait a year to see the final installment. I knew I would be sucked in again.
Finally, in February 2004, I managed to set aside a weekend, borrowed the DVDs for Fellowship and Two Towers, and watched them both. I then called my friend Suze, lender of the TT DVD, and said, “I have to go see Return of the King … NOW!” We headed off to a matinee that afternoon.
I was hooked again. The following weekend I watched all three again, and ordered copies of the extended DVDs of FOTR and TT for myself. I wanted to go a third time and started wondering about my sanity. I bought copies of the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings books, but I didn’t dare start them for fear that my business would collapse from neglect. Fortunately I was scheduled for a week in Hawaii in mid-March, so I took the books with me and spent the first five days of my vacation working through their 1300 pages.
Now I could let go, right? Uh, well, now I needed to see the movies again because I was confused about some of the differences between the films and the books. And I hadn’t yet gotten to watch the extended DVDs I’d ordered. So the weekend after my return from Hawaii, I watched all three movies again. Starting to sound a bit obsessed?
It’s now April 10, 2004, three weeks since I last saw the movies. Return of the King is still playing in a theater about an hour from here, and every few days I am drawn to check the listings. I keep telling myself I have to wait until the DVD is out May 25th but I’m not sure that I will. I’ve also read almost all of the LOTR a second time — I started by going back over sections to compare them to the movies, and then found it hard to stop. Now I am working my way through the appendices. I am determined not to let myself buy the Silmarillion, I can’t afford the time!
Why choose Brego.net?
When I started becoming obsessed with the LOTR movies, I thought about building a web site. I didn’t know what I would put up on it but wanted a name that was short, easy to remember and spell, and with positive connotations. No orcs.com for me. Of course all the obvious ones (frodo.com, samwise.com and such) are taken, so I looked for a secondary or tertiary character. When I saw Brego I knew it was the right choice as I have been horse-crazy since I was about 3 years old. Coincidentally, the “Brego the Builder” references from the books also struck a note with me, as I built a house a few years ago.
The cynical might say that it’s because Brego is the only character in the movie other than Arwen who gets to kiss Aragorn on the mouth, but I say this is absolutely and completely irrelevant. Please be kind and don’t argue with me about this.